Details

Here are more DISNEYLAND DETAILS - photos that have zoomed in on some tiny aspect of a ride or building. Both of these are undated, but definitely from the 1950s.

First up is a detail that fascinated me as a child... the big blue eye of Monstro the Whale, the "host" (?) of the Storybook Land Canal Boats. I guess most hosts don't swallow you, but Monstro has always thought outside the box. I would happily watch a 30 minute documentary about how this eye was made; is it cast resin? The iris was surely hand-painted on the inside of the clear semi-sphere. The addition of the blinking eyelid (perhaps once a minute?), along with the occasional spray from his blow-hole made him feel just a little bit "alive".

I've seen a number of photos of the Mark Twain in which you can see somebody looking down at the turning paddle wheel at the stern. I feel like it's usually a boy, or an older man, but I'm sure plenty of girls and women have looked too. I wonder how long those wooden paddles can last, being constantly wet? Do they still use wood, or something that just looks like wood? I just scanned another slide that is almost exactly the same as this one, but I'll share it some other time.